Companies | Björn Wahlroos’ more than 20-year Sampo sky ended – “Difference always means new and mostly better”

For a long time financial influencer of the line by Björn Wahlroos the era under Sammo’s leadership ended. On Wednesday, Sampo held its general meeting, and Wahlroos stepped aside as chairman of the company’s board.

At the same time, an era ends when the 70-year-old financial professional retires from his significant positions of trust.

Sampo according to Wahlroos, has changed rapidly along the way. It started from the roots of the insurance company Sammo and the state Postibank. According to him, the success had been very mediocre.

“All my friends know that when I say mediocre, it means bad,” Wahlroos stated in an interview organized for shareholders and the media before the general meeting.

Sampo bought the non-life insurance company If, and the Finnish non-life insurance business was also merged with it. According to Wahlroos, the deal is one of the best business deals ever made in Finland.

Wahlroos says that he has never done such a good deal, and he will never do it again. It wasn’t a bad deal either, when Sampo sold its banking business, the former Sampo Bank, to the Danish Danske Bank just before the financial crisis for four billion euros.

According to him, it was an offer that could not be refused.

“I didn’t find any horse’s head in my bed,” he says in reference Godfatherto the movies.

Wahlroos career took off in the university world.

The doctor of economics worked as a professor of economics in the 1970s and 1980s at Hanken University of Economics and Business. In addition, he was a visiting assistant professor in the United States at Brown and Northwestern universities.

Wahlroos moved from university to the corporate world. He moved to Suomen Yhdyspankki and eventually ended up as its deputy CEO at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s.

The investment bank Mandatum was founded by Wahlroos in the early 1990s.

Investointipankki acted as an advisor in many business acquisitions and arrangements in the 1990s, in which the structures of the Finnish economy were organized into a new pattern after the recession and the liberalization of the capital market. Mandatum’s shareholders, other than Wahlroos, became wealthy.

In the early 2000s, Wahlroos was wanted to lead Sampo-Leonia, which was born from the merger of the insurance company Sampo and the state Postipankki.

The CEO’s contract included that Mandatum was merged into a part of the company and Wahlroos received two percent of Sampo’s shares as payment.

These shares eventually made him a wealthy man, as successful acquisitions and business management inflated Sampo’s value. On that side, the Finnish state, which owned a large slice of Sammo, also benefited, among others.

Wahlroos retired from the position of Group CEO of Sampo in 2009.

Although formally retirement days have arrived, has an active role from his work on the boards of Sammo and UPM. During his retirement, he has acted as chairman of the board of both UPM and Sampo. In addition, he served as the chairman of Nordea’s board in 2011–2019.

UPM’s wash ended earlier this spring, and Wahlroos stepped into his shoes Henrik Ehrnrooth. In Sammo, his successor will be Antti Mäkinen.

Before the general meeting, Mäkinen stated to HS that he was very motivated by the new task. He says that he does not look forward to the task with enthusiasm, but rather with motivation, because it is, after all, work.

When Wahlroos eventually moved to Sampo, he planned to stay in the company for about 3–5 years.

“That was a foolish thing for a young man to say.”

However, his career in the company stretched to 23 years. According to him, those years were fantastic years.

Now his path in Sammo has come to an end.

According to Wahlroos, the moment of parting is always a bit wistful and includes minor tones. However, he states that separation is usually always a happy thing, because separation involves renewal and creative destruction.

“Difference always means something new and usually better.”

Wahlroos the last big game move was the separation of Sampo’s subsidiary Mandatum into an independent listed company. The decision was made at the end of March.

Wahlroos commented in March for HSthat listing seemed like the most likely option for a longer time.

Mandates were tried to be sold, but in the end, listing on the stock exchange remained the only solution.

Over 2,100 people had announced in advance that they would come to Sampo’s general meeting. Euroclear at the end of April, the company had a total of more than 205,000 shareholders.

Before the start of the general meeting, the audience and shareholders could ask questions to Wahlroos who came on stage.

One of those present asked if he would run for president someday. The comment makes the audience applaud and Wahlroos laugh.

There was no 100% negative answer, but the message was clear.

“No sane person lives in Tamminiemi. ”

Tamminiemi used to work Urho Kekkonen as an official residence, but currently the official residence of the President of the Republic is in Mäntyniemi.

However, Wahlroos has plenty of political views. He opened them on Wednesday both in the interview before the general meeting and in his opening speech at the general meeting. According to Wahlroos, both the reform of unemployment insurance and the reduction of taxation are necessary measures for Finland. According to him, earnings-related unemployment insurance should be significantly stepped up and shortened.

According to Wahlroos, the public finance deficit is a symptom and consequence of poor economic growth. According to him, investment must be made in growth, which means investing in entrepreneurs.

“I’ve been very vocal, but no one has listened,” Wahlroos comments on his position as a social debater.

Wahlroos is surprisingly modest about his role in Sammo and stated that managing the company is not a one-man show.

Would he do anything differently in his career?

No. He can’t think of a single big, upsetting deal.

“Somehow life has treated me pretty well.”

Sampo’s website was used as a source.

Correction on May 17, 2023 at 10:01 p.m.: Wahlroos referred Godfather– with his reference to Danske Bank and not to If, as was wrongly claimed in the story at the beginning.